Gett: The Trial of Viviane Amsalem

Rated NR115 min.2015

An Israeli woman seeking to finalize a divorce (gett) from her estranged husband finds herself effectively put on trial by her country's religious marriage laws. In Israel, there is neither civil marriage nor civil divorce; only Orthodox rabbis can legalize a union or its dissolution, which is only possible with the husband's full consent. Trapped in a loveless marriage, Viviane Amsalem has been applying for a divorce for three years but her religiously devout husband Elisha, continually refuses. His cold intransigence, Viviane's determination to fight for her freedom, and the ambiguous role of the rabbinical judges shape a procedure where tragedy vies with absurdity and everything is brought out into the open for judgment.